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Do you live in one of the most dangerous cities in New Jersey?

We all watch the news and see reports on Facebook of the latest crimes that happen in our hometowns. But it can be hard to tell at a big picture level how dangerous our town actually is.

No one wants to feel unsafe, and statistically speaking, odds are that where you live is most likely relatively safe. In order to help the good people of New Jersey — and anyone looking to move to New Jersey — know just how close they are to danger, we took data from the annual FBI report and did some serious analysis.

The data shows that these ten cities are currently the most dangerous in the Garden State:

Why did Wildwood take the top spot? For the answer to this question and a detailed explanation of the data and analysis we used in creating this ranking, read on. Or learn more about the safest places in New Jersey.

How we determined the most dangerous cities in New Jersey for 2018?

Every year the FBI release two crime datasets, a preliminary dataset limited to the biggest cities in the country, followed by a more detailed release at the end of the year.

For our analysis, we focused on the JUST released 2016 data, specifically the 2016 Crime In The United States Report. We will update the results when data becomes available for 2017 in October 2018.

So what criteria did we use? Have a look:

Violent Crimes Per Capita

Property Crimes Per Capita

In order to make the analysis as apples to apples as possible, we only considered cities over 5,000 in population. That left us with 353 cities in New Jersey.

We then ranked each city from 1 to 353 for the two criteria with a #1 ranking being the most dangerous for the particular criteria.

Next, we averaged the two rankings into one “Dangerous Index”.

Finally, we ranked every city on the “Dangerous Index” with the lowest index being the most dangerous in New Jersey — Wildwood. Read on for a detailed look at the 10 most dangerous cities in New Jersey.

Here’s a visualization of the criteria:

Click To Enlarge

Read on for a detailed look at the 10 most dangerous cities in New Jersey.

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1. Wildwood

Population: 5,115Rank Last Year: 2 (Up 1)Violent Crimes Per 100k: 1,309Property Crimes Per 100k: 7,878
Wildwood earns the top spot on this list mostly by having a terrible rate of property crime, with residents facing a ridiculously high 1 in 12.7 chance of being the victim of a property crime in 2016.

That means that, statistically, almost every neighborhood in Wildwood has at least one resident who’s the victim of theft or arson each year.

Don’t let the 3rd place ranking for violence fool you either — for every 76 residents in Wildwood, there was 1 instance of violent crime in 2016, which is makes violence pretty darn common in Wildwood.

2. Asbury Park

Population: 15,757Rank Last Year: 3 (Up 1)Violent Crimes Per 100k: 1,415Property Crimes Per 100k: 4,588
Located on the Jersey Shore in east-central New Jersey, Asbury Park ranks as the 2nd most dangerous.

The 1.6 sq. mile city has not seen any improvements in its violent crime in recent years, but property crime did drop by an impressive amount between 2014-16.

That’s good, because without this improvement, Asbury Park’s property crime rate would be the worst in New Jersey.

3. Millville

Population: 28,177Rank Last Year: 4 (Up 1)Violent Crimes Per 100k: 791Property Crimes Per 100k: 6,082
Located in southern New Jersey, Millville is the 9th most violent of the most dangerous cities, but it’s 3rd in terms of property crime.

That is partially due to a hike in property crime from 2014-16, which left residents with a 1 in 16.4 chance of being the victim of theft or arson in 2016.

Violent crime also went up during this period, so Millville’s trend means it might stay in the top for a few years.

5. Elizabeth

Population: 129,096Rank Last Year: 11 (Up 6)Violent Crimes Per 100k: 816Property Crimes Per 100k: 3,202
Elizabeth is the 4th most populous state in New Jersey, and is the economic and cultural hub of its part of New Jersey.

The population has been growing for the first time in 50 years, but the crime numbers remain relatively high.

Though property crime fell by 25% from 2014-16, violent crime also rose by 12%, leaving residents a 1 in 122 chance of being the victim of violence in 2016.

6. Orange

Source: Public Domain

Population: 30,470 Rank Last Year: 12 (Up 6)Violent Crimes Per 100k: 1,122Property Crimes Per 100k: 2,766
Orange is the most populous city in Bergen County.

Orange experienced a massive rise in violent crime between 2014-16.

Property crime statistics, meanwhile, remained stagnant, with residents facing a 1 in 36.1 chance of being the victim of theft or arson each year — the 26th highest rate in the state.

7. Vineland

Population: 60,823Rank Last Year: 8 (Up 1)Violent Crimes Per 100k: 488Property Crimes Per 100k: 3,965
Vineland is the 7th most dangerous city in New Jersey overall.

From 2015, the property crime rate dropped, which is good news for people who like knowing that their stuff is safe.

The bad news for people who like their safety, though, is that violent crime ranks 19th in New Jersey.

8. Neptune Township

Source: Public Domain

Population: 27,505 Rank Last Year: 7 (Down 1)Violent Crimes Per 100k: 574Property Crimes Per 100k: 3,333
Located in central Jersey and named after the Roman god, Neptune Township experienced a drop in its property crime rate between 2014-16.

That’s a difference of residents having about a 1 in 15 shot of being the victim of theft or arson at the begining to a 1 in 30.0 shot in 2016.

Violent crime, meanwhile, remained at around the same level.

9. Trenton

Population: 83,644Rank Last Year: 15 (Up 6)Violent Crimes Per 100k: 1,347Property Crimes Per 100k: 2,613
New Jersey’s capital, Trenton, almost escaped being included on this list, but being the 9th most violent city in the state kept it in the top ten most dangerous.

Residents of Trenton had a 1 in 74 chance of being the victim of a violent crime in 2016.

Property crime also went down to a 1 in 38.3 chance in 2014-16, meaning, if the trends continue, Trenton may avoid this list altogether come next year.

Statistics aren’t everything. Need to add a few columns on how safe people feel and include younger people whose statistics often don’t show up, how about count ‘bullying’ complaints. For some examples, Cherry Hill isn’t low on violence, they make up for it with dangerous schools when they’re young and with racism in stealthy ways they can get away with if you’re near them – still in Camden County. Tenafly safe? It’s like a police state, police setup roadblocks stopping women with babies and stop everyone entering the city. People and police tell others they don’t belong there and treat outsiders very poorly, don’t put your kids in schools there. Bad place and dangerous to anyone entering. Police and courts do the violence which doesn’t show up on statistics and their reputation is very bad. They segregate every people, kids complain about racial violence in Tenafly school and it comes back from them to everyone else. The local court is considered among the most corrupt in the state.

This also seems heavily moderated unless it takes weeks for comments to post – freedom of speech? Presence of links? Maybe roadsnacks should post how many comments make and don’t make it.